Jennifer Lopez on JLo Beauty’s First Lip Product, Beso Balm, Her ’90s Supermodel-inspired Routine and Self-acceptance
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Jennifer Lopez expands into the lip category with her newest JLo Beauty product: Beso Balm Ultra-Hydrating Lip Mask.
Launching Thursday, it’s a balm-mask hybrid meant to be reapplied during the day and worn thicker overnight.
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“I wanted to create really my dream balm,” Lopez said over the phone. “I just hadn’t found one yet that ticks all the boxes. So, I went to work creating my own, which is how we come up with a lot of the ideas for the products. I’m like, ‘OK, we have a glow serum. We have the cleanser, the serum, moisturizer, the SPF, the mask. What’s missing? What else am I putting on at night that’s part of that routine?’ And it was always lip balm.”
The formula comes from South Korea, a buttery texture with a vanilla scent. The flavor is inspired by Lopez’s favorite childhood dessert, flan de vainilla.
“It was like being back in my grandma’s kitchen,” she said. “I’m obsessed with it. She would only make it at Christmas, sometimes at Thanksgiving, and I would just look forward to it all year.”
Using candelilla leaf extract for a smoothing effect, Beso Balm aims to deliver a hydrating, non-sticky plump look with a glossy finish. Priced at $19 (8 ml), it’s available online at jlobeauty.com, sephora.com, amazon.com, revolve.com and select Macy’s stores (as well as online). Beso Balm will be included in the JLo Beauty holiday gifts sets, also out Thursday.
“When I go to bed, the last thing I do is I put on my lip balm,” Lopez said. “It’s literally by my bed right now.”
Her lip routine these days is ’90s-inspired, she said: “I’ve started doing this kind of modern twist on the supermodel lip where you do the darker liner and shade and then just put a lipstick in the middle that’s lighter. But with the Beso Balm, I do it not as dark as they used to do for the supermodels, but just a little bit darker than my natural lip. I shade it, I contour the edges and then I put the Beso Balm in the middle for a very pouty, glossy wet lip look. It gives you the bigness but it also gives you this pouty, kissable, beautiful, glossy lip.”
Beso is Spanish for kiss after all, an ode to her Puerto Rican roots.
“We have a huge Latina following,” said Lisa Sequino, cofounder and chief executive officer of JLo Beauty. “And obviously Jennifer is of Puerto Rican heritage, so we felt like it was a nice way to cross over and be a little bit more playful with the name.”
Staying mum on financials, Sequino said they expect Beso Balm “to do just as well or more than our JLo Body launch last year. And our JLo Body sold out in less than 24 hours. So, we have big ambitions for this.”
After entering Macy’s in October, JLo Beauty has ambitions for international expansion.
“I believe it’s going to pave the path for future endeavors,” Sequino said of venturing into lip care. “We also only offer our branded products in North America. So, we look forward to seeing a bright future and many opportunities ahead internationally. The customer has definitely demanded that we go international for some time.”
Consumers have largely been career women and moms aged between 30 and 50, she added. “I like to call her the everyday superstar, because she does it all — just like Jennifer can do the Super Bowl and then also pick up her children from school.”
A day in Lopez’s life as of late — she’s married to husband Ben Affleck and sharing twins with ex-husband Marc Anthony — is centered on music, while balancing acting, producing and life as an entrepreneur.
“I’ve been working really hard on my new album project,” she said of “This Is Me…Now,” which will be her ninth studio album. “It’s a big project. I announced it last year as a musical experience, a trilogy, and I’m very excited about that. And so that’ll start in this fall and in the winter and into next year. And as far as JLo Beauty, there’s gonna to be a lot of amazing moments to bring those two worlds together in a powerful way, hopefully.”
Asked about her definition of beauty and how it’s evolved through the years, she said: “My mom always, maybe not told me, but shows me by example, that I didn’t need the likes and acceptances of other people to feel good about myself. And it took me a long time to truly believe that she was right. But now I try to pass that lesson on to my own children, especially in this age of social media. But it’s ultimately something that we each need to discover on our own. But it is really true. Being and feeling good about yourself and laying your head down on your pillow and feeling good about the things you did today, whether it was your beauty routine or you worked out or you helped somebody who needed help, those types of things is what should make you like and accept yourself, not when somebody thinks about a picture you posted or about a comment you made or anything like that.”
She went on, “Understanding what self-love is taught me to unapologetically own every part of me, my body, my voice, my choices. You know, even my mistakes. And today I really believe that. Being beautiful is being beautiful on the inside and the outside and being comfortable in that skin, in your own skin. We’ve all got hang ups, and we’ve all made mistakes, but those imperfections, if we allow them, help us and make us grow and also make us one of a kind. There’s nothing more beautiful, I think, than a woman who knows who she is and owns it completely.”
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